A new restaurant at 10 Neild Avenue

Number 10 Neild Avenue in Rushcutters Bay should have some tales
to tell. Since it first opened as a restaurant in 2011,
high-profile restaurateurs have come and gone and, from today, its
walls will be privy to some new secrets.

Bar Machiavelli is the next chapter: a 160-seat Italian pasta
bar and diner from Paola Toppi, of Machiavelli restaurant in the
CBD and Sciue Sciue in Double Bay. "Bar Machiavelli is a pastaria,"
she says. "No secondi, just antipasti and beautiful and simple
bowls of pasta."

In the past five years the site has seen everything from luxed-up
kebabs under the
guidance of Robert Marchetti and Maurice Terzini to a cook's
co-op of heirlooms as Rushcutters with Marty Boetz, and milk flan
with dulce de leche during a brief stint as POPteño. But Toppi is unfazed by number 10's
track record, and believes the high-energy and casual Bar
Machiavelli is exactly what the warehouse space needs. "Big
restaurants are hard to fill, sure, and when we opened Machiavelli
in the CBD it was a white elephant," she says. "That was 27 years
ago, and I still love white elephants."

Most of the pasta will be handmade on site and, apart from
Machiavelli's signature duck ragù pappardelle, most will be done
with sauces "that don't take hours to make, but are made to order",
says Toppi. There'll be the likes of tagliatelle with pesto, pine
nuts and parmesan alongside antipasti such as golden panko-crumbed
prawns, culatello and a carpaccio of the day.

Matteo Belkeziz, late of Rockpool Bar & Grill and Palmer & Co,
has developed the cocktail list, which is built on Italian classics
with a Mediterranean twist. The menu includes a barrel-aged Negroni
made with grappa, a monthly Bellini special and a Tiramisù Martini
- "no spoon or fork required".